Something to feel a little better about.
From Roy Beck, numbersusa.com.
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I know that it is sad to think that 6 months after the attacks on America, the U.S. House of Representatives has thrown all caution to the wind and voted to make the nation somewhat less secure through the Section 245i amnesty for illegal aliens. And I know it is sad to think that with all the traffic, school, etc. congestion and damage to the environment from overpopulation, the House would vote to increase population growth still more by enticing hundreds of thousands of additional illegal aliens to move here.
But .........
The incredibly good showing for our side tonight on the House floor may have great implications for slowing the amnesty freight trains that run out of the Republican White House and the Democratic congressional leadership offices. The reason is that the House GOP leadership may refuse to open up the track for those trains through the House in the near future.
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Here is what our Capitol Hill staff already are hearing from inside GOP leadership circles in the last half-hour: ============================================================
"You guys at NumbersUSA have just scored a tremendous victory. ... The closeness of the vote has not gone unnoticed by the leaders."
"This close vote probably just signed the death knell for any future amnesties."
"You should have your citizen network immediately thank all the Members who voted against their party leadership, and crucify all the ones who voted for this amnesty."
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One vote short of victory
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Because Pres. Bush was in such a hurry to get this passed as a gift to Mexican Pres. Fox in his trip down there in two weeks, the White House pushed the GOP House leaders to bring the amnesty up outside normal channels. To do that, you have to put an item on the suspension (of the rules) calendar. That takes a two-thirds (66.67%) vote.
They were able to muster a 66.75% vote and barely win.
The vote was 275-137. If we had gotten one more vote, we would have won.
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Now, you may feel depressed that we couldn't even get one vote more than a third. But remember that: =========================================================
* Many, many Republicans who voted for this amnesty, privately opposed it. They voted for it because of the heavy arm-twisting by the White House to support the Commander-in-Chief. One Republican who voted for it told us this afternoon, "This is the most hypocritical vote I've cast in 10 years." He cheered us on even as he allowed the White House to handle him like a puppet.
* A decent-sized fraction of the Democrats are not excited about these amnesties. But they have no Democrat who will stand up and really take the lead to give them cover to switch to our side.
* Most Democrats have put little thought into this and just blindly follow Daschle, Gephart and McAuliff as they call for open borders. If they could begin to see their constituents noticing and condemning the open borders, we could have a chance with them.
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More good news in the votes
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Although their numbers were small, the 13 Democrats who stood up against their party's monolithic open borders stance were a significant bunch and far greater than the usual two or three who Democrats don't consider to be Democrats anyway.
We haven't analyzed them, but I will bet you that nearly all are in districts where it is possible for a Republican to win. Democrats who need moderates and independents to stay in office are going to see that they cannot stand for open borders and massive federally forced population growth.
Republicans voted 123-92 against their President, against their House leadership, against their Judiciary Chairman, against the GOP conference office that did a blitz on them this afternoon, against all the GOP handlers who say the only way the GOP can survive is to pander to illegality.
That vote is an incredible rebuke of party leadership.
Hastert, Delay, Blunt, etc. know that they can only anger the majority of their party for so long before they will no longer be the leaders. They will bear a great deal of resentment at the White House for putting them into this mess -- which they resisted until they felt they had no choice.
The open borders people in the White House who have announced that they have several more amnesties they want to try may find the going getting tougher.
Who was this, Ron Paul?! I was beginning to think there was at least one man in congress that didn't drink the water, but it looks like he's just like the rest of them after all. Once bitten twice shy--I guess his stint at going independent taught him a lesson about bucking the pubbies.
Words and pep talks don't mean a thing now. I'm done being "managed" or handled.
It wasn't really that close-- each party decided who would be sacrificed, because they know it doesn't make any difference, so long as there are only the RATs and PUBBIEs to deal with-- and they can keep people believing that the parties are representative of FRee people.